Kids & video games

[reverbbb]

Well, this is a follow-up post about my son that I asked for prayers about his video gaming addiction. Things seem to be a little less tense around the house these days. A lot of the tension was from my wife who was standing her ground hard and firm.

Yesterday I ask my wife over the phone, 'what was the note that our friend sent her?'. Apparently, this was an ice breaker question. My wife told me that the note was a reassurance and a sort of prayer about her struggle with my son's video gaming. My wife then went on to tell me about her true feelings in a way that I could acknowledge them. This lead into allowing me to suggest an alternate plan to the cold-turkey approach.

I suggested that my son could play any of the "E" rated games, and 'some' of the "T" rated games with our approval. But no "M" or "A" rated games. The playing time windows would remain as they were before, but he had to show an effort for improving his grades.

When he got home from school, she told him of the 'new deal'. This was a GREAT sign. I think this lifted his spirits a lot. Though I'm sure he still feels that he is being too monitored.

But hey, I think we have progress. I don't think that the situation is completely behind us yet, but he now understands that we mean business.

I credit this forum and our friends for the prayers that we have offered on our behalf. I thank you all very much for your prayers.

[kewlpack]

Amen bro!

Great approach. We use a similar approach for just about everything in our home when dealing with entertainment.

--Video Games "E" and only a few "T" ones.
--Music: Christian or instrumental only. Very little non-Christian (ya even for me the guitar-fool).
--TV: We try to avoid just about everything really... cartoons (selected), well-edited-for-tv movies, news, animal planet... etc. Mostly family friendly things.
--Movies: We will only go see non-R rated stuff. Even then, only select PG-13 or lower ones. Let me just say that Hollywood is really pushing the envelope under PG-13 and we see less and less of those.

Okay so we stumble sometimes and make dumb choices on this or that - but the rule of thumb usually prevails.

Just posting this to maybe help encourage you that there are some other folks who have worked out some good guidelines.

God bless!
~A~

[ptrallan1]

My parents exposed me to everything with little censorship and since I didn't get caught or cause any discernable trouble until my senior year in high school by the time they realized the danger it was too late.

Thank God they exposed me to Him too!

Keep it Reverbb, keep it up and you will have a son you will be very very proud of.

Peter

9/17/04, edit webmaster: added user name (control not set requiring registry at time, but it is now)

[TheViking]

..... balance. I grew up in a home where almost everything was a sin. No card games, no movies, no rock n roll, no drinking, smoking, not much anything but classical music, some jazz and whatever u could do in church.
I know my parents meant it well and did what they thought was right, but when i reached a certain age and really met the outside world, i had no experience what so ever on where to draw the lines. I admit i was a wild one before i was able to take what i was taught at home and combine it with what I wanted in my life. I think it is important that we do not alienate the kids who grow up, but set firm rules and explain why we do it. That way, when they meet the outside world, they will know why u should avoid certain things and not only know that it is a "sin"

[Old Believer]

This is an interesting thread.

My son, who is six, is very limited to the entertainment he has access to.

Electronic games - Only games rated "E".

TV - Only cartoons, i.e. Disney Channel stuff, Nickelodeon. My wife is a better monitor of this then I am. We also use the V chip on the TV to keep him from stumbling into something he shouldn't.

We don't have to worry about music, just yet.

[reverbbb]

In order to keep the spirits up in the household, we let up on the restrictions a bit. My is now only allowed to play on non-school nights or weekend days. We tried to limit even those sessions to 2 hours per day. But that is just very impracticle to enforce, and he does not get the depth of playing that he wants in two hours.

My son showed signs of being intrigued by the Target, Walmart and TRU video game displays ever since he was a tiny tot. But he knew that he was restricted from bringing any home. But about 2 years ago, he discovered that he could use his computer and several of his friends had games that they would "loan" him. One thing lead to another, now he is obscessed with video gaming.

We faught that battle long and hard this past Fall. But it was breaking the spirit of our household. As I think I had already mentioned, there are other things that he could find in place of this obscession. So, we made a parental decission and bent the rules for him so that we can avoid the other evils that he might decide to dabble in instead.

He does acknowledge that we opened up his restrictions and is appreciative about it. My next battle is to reduce his gaming activity from 20 hours per weekend to 10 hours.

[Old Believer]

With my son it's not video games, it's TV in general. We've had a run of bad weather, so he doesn't get outside very much, right now. We've had to limit his TV time to 1 hour per day. All he want's to do is sit around and whatch cartoons.